How to Heat a Room using Passive Solar Heat in Winter. Works Anywhere!

My bedroom has a pitched ceiling. It was a selling point and I thought it was a very nice feature when I bought The Condo. That is until I tried to heat the bedroom because, well, heat rises. Now of course I could replace the bedroom chandelier with a ceiling fan and run the blades in reverse during the winter to pull the warm heated air from the pitched ceiling to the lower part of the room where the people live. That’s a very good idea if it weren’t for one thing.

I find almost all ceiling fans with lights horrific and UUUUUUUUUUGLY!

I wanted to heat the bedroom up in winter but I was hesitant to use a space heater to do it. Since I was trying to reduce The Condo’s use of electricity, I really didn’t want to use an electric space heater. I didn’t want to use a propane or kerosene space heater either. I didn’t want an accidental case of hot burning Pekingese on my hands if you know what I mean.

Instead, I tried using the free passive solar space heater that I already had – opening the curtains on the bedroom windows. According to Build It Solar:

“Windows are very good solar collectors -- they are just as efficient as a commercial solar collector you might add on your roof, and can be less expensive and less complex to install. No ducting or plumbing required.”

In addition to opening the curtains, Building it Solar also suggests adding some shading to the Passive Solar Heating System, I mean, Open Curtains on My South Facing Windows. They say:

• “Adding some form of insulating thermal shade to the window will greatly reduce night heat loss. While windows are very good collectors, they do lose a lot of heat at night, so some form of insulating shade is very important to reduce night losses.
• You should include some means to shade the window during the summer. Unwanted solar gain through an unprotected south facing window during the summer can aggravate cooling problems. There are many ways to provide shading.”

I didn't install any of the complicated (and ugly) outdoor awnings or shade screens that Making It Solar suggests on my windows. Instead, I made two insulated roman shades and put them up on tension rods in my bedroom windows. They work just fine. 

Why do the solar energy advocates have to make using passive solar heat so complicated? Yeesh.
I was very skeptical that opening the curtains on the south facing windows of The Condo would help heat up the bedroom. Sure, I sealed the air leaks on my double paned windows. That wasn’t the problem.

The problem, I thought, is that we don’t get that much sunlight in Central Ohio, especially during the winter. In Columbus, 51% of the days of the year are overcast – the same amount of sunlight that they get in Inverness, Scotland. And they aren’t exactly known for their balmy weather or big solar farms.

But, hey, the price was right – free – so I tried it. My bedroom is on the second floor of The Condo, so I didn’t have to worry about peeping neighbors or burglers. I opened the curtains on the south facing bedroom windows in the morning before Husband left for work. I let the sun shine in during the day and kept the bedroom door open to let the air circulate around the room (and I’m kinda lazy about closing that door anyway.) I closed the curtains in the evening around 6:00 or so – when I finished work.

So did it work? You tell me. Blitzkrieg by his very nature, seeks out the warmest places in The Condo during the winter, usually on the first floor or in the second floor computer room. Guess where he’s hanging out now?

That’s right. In the now much warmer solar heated master bedroom.

Yes, opening my curtains and shades and using this freebie passive solar space heater did heat up the bedroom, despite the pitched ceiling. So much so that I didn’t have to even think about buying a space heater to use in the bedroom as long as I remembered to close the curtains and lowered the insulated shade at night to keep in the heat.

During the summer, I keep the roman shades down and the curtains closed on the bedroom windows to keep the hot summer sun from heating up the bedroom too much.

It worked. In Ohio. Who knew?!

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How to Keep Water Pipes From Freezing

Like most of the country, we are experiencing some cold weather. Make that very cold weather. Like it’s going to be 5 degrees below zero with a wind chill factor of twelve degrees below zero at night kind of cold weather. Brrr.

With weather like that we don’t want the water pipes in The Condo to freeze. We’re following the advice we got from the evening news. We are letting a small steady drip of water run from the faucets with plumbing that’s on the outside walls of The Condo. They also suggested that you open the cabinet doors under those sinks so the room heat can reach the pipes and keep them from freezing. So far, it’s working.

One caution that goes with keeping the cabinet doors open all day is that you might have to worry about small children or pets getting into the harmful cleaners that you may have stored underneath your sink. Well, here’s another unexpected surprise I got when I switched to using environmentally friendly baking soda and vinegar to clean The Condo (yeah, I know. I thought it was weird but it worked, who knew?) is that I don’t have to worry if Blitzkrieg gets into the cleaning supplies I store under the sinks. The worse thing that could happen to Blitzkrieg is that he might get a foamy baking soda and vinegar beard on his chin.

Dairy Free Dark Pumpernickel Bread Recipe

For us, 15 bean soup is a quick, easy, and cheap dinner even though we cook it slow. “Slow cook a quick meal? What are you talking about? Have you been sniffing low VOC glue again?” You say.

No, I’m not crazy or damaged (much.) I say that 15 bean soup is quick because it’s a low effort meal – perfect for those nights when you can’t cook a huge dinner due to prior commitments but don’t want to feed the family junky fast food.

I say that 15 bean soup is slow because we use the crock pot to cook the 15 bean soup mix. 15 bean soup is one of the few meals that we buy in premix form. It’s one of the few things we eat that it’s cheaper to go with the mix than with buying bags of all the different types of beans that are typically in this soup and most of the dried bean soup mixes sold in our area are pretty healthy.

 

Husband tosses the beans, water, spice mix, and whatever meat we have on hand in the slow cooker) in the morning and by the time he comes home from work, we have a very tasty soup ready for dinner. If you’re a vegetarian, I’m told that beets make a tasty substitute for using meat to flavor this soup although we haven’t tried it because Husband doesn’t like beets.

Insulate a Hot Water Heater the Easy Way

While on the hunt for ways to reduce The Condo’s energy use, I did some poking around in my utility room. I found a big energy hog – my hot water heater.

Sure, I keep my hot water heater set at 120 degrees (F.) Set any higher and a hot water heater uses a lot more energy to heat water than I care to pay for and is a scalding risk. Set any lower and harmful bacteria can grow inside the hot water tank. That’s something you do not want.

 

 As like everything else that came with The Condo, the hot water heater was new but it is not Energy Star rated. I did some research and found that if I replaced my current practically new and working hot water heater with a comparable Energy Star model, I would only reduce its natural gas consumption by about $5-10 a year.

How to Make a Braided Fleece Pet Toy

I had some scrap fleece leftover from a sewing project. I also had a friend whose Boston Terrier puppy was still going through that Chew And Disembowel Every Toy I Have phase – did I mention his name is Chopper? Yeah, the little guy is living up to his name.

I put that scrap fleece to good use and made Chopper and Blitzkrieg some braided dog toys. These homemade braided chew toys will work well for a dog or a cat. Cats like to play with the longer braided toys, though.

How to Make and Keep New Year's Resolutions on Your Time, Not New Year's Day

I’ve been hesitant and dragging my feet about writing, a post about my New Year’s Resolutions. It’s not that I don’t make them. I do . I don’t usually make my New Years Resolutions on or around New Years Eve because I end up making and ultimately breaking those hastily made resolutions.

I find that I’m better at keeping my New Years Resolutions if I make them when I need them. Usually several months before or after January first. Sometimes I even make them in the middle of the year. For example, my 2008 New Year’s Resolution was to reduce The Condo’s natural gas and electricity usage by 20% because of a big utility bill that we received in the fall of 2007. Well things really didn’t get rolling with the savings until March of 2008 because I had to examine and change some habits and do some small upgrades to The Condo but for the most part, I ended up meeting my goal and thereby keeping my 2008 New Years Resolution that I made in November of 2007.

20% Home Utility Reduction Challenge – December Update & Tips

It’s the last month of my 2007 20% Home Utility Reduction Challenge! Let’s see how I did at reducing my home's electric and natural gas consumption by 20% in December.

December Electricity Usage

Even with putting up electric holiday lights and decorations, I significantly reduced how much electricity we used in December. I’m sure that I could have reduced that number by not putting up any holiday lights but I really didn’t want to do that. One of my goals of the 20% Home Utility Reduction Challenge was to prove that I could reduce my electricity and natural gas consumption and not have to endure major hardships or put in huge sacrifices. I like Christmas with all it’s trimmings including holiday lights. To me ignoring the whole thing, as some Greenzillas would prefer the world to do, is a major hardship and huge sacrifice for me. I think that life is a balancing act and yes, you can still have some holiday decorations if it makes you happy just try not to overdo it so that you have so many incandescent lights up that you can see your house from space. Of course, your mileage may vary on this issue.


However, my personal balancing act is paying off. Last December I used 641 Kwh of electricity, approximately 21 Kwh a day. This December I reduced that load to 449 Kwh of electricity, approximately 15 Kwh a day. That’s a 70% reduction in electricity for the month of December! Whoo-hoo!

How I Lowered My Electric Bill in December